Promotional display stands have been used in supermarkets, convenience stores and other retail outlets for a number of years to stimulate impulse buying of a wide variety of products. Display stands are often preferable to stacking articles in boxes in an aisle or other location, and/or placing such products in their normal location on the shelves of a retail establishment. Many display stands feature signs or other advertisements for the product being sold, and often include aesthetically pleasing artwork to attract the customer's attention to the product displayed.
Although often advantageous in stimulating sales of different items, many display stands have one or more drawbacks which limit their effectiveness or practicality. For example, a number of display stands are shipped to the supermarket, convenience store or other retail establishment in a collapsed condition for ease of transport and storing. Such display stands can be difficult and time consuming to erect which takes time away from the normal activities of stocking personnel in such retail establishments. Even if the display stand is designed to self-erect, it must nevertheless be retrieved from storage, and thereafter stocked with product, before the display is ready for use. This is a time consuming and labor intensive operation. See, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. RE. 32,668; 4,949,851; 4,801,024; 4,760,928; 4,726,476; 4,723,664; 4,646,922; 4,493,424; 4,311,100; 4,151,803; and 2,797,815.
Another problem with certain types of display stands is their lack of mobility. In many instances, the display stand must be located in the desired position within the retail establishment, stocked with items to be sold and then left there until all the items displayed are purchased or the stock is removed by employees of the establishment. The store owner is not permitted to-change the location of the display stand once it is stocked in order to determine where the particular product displayed might sell best, unless an employee unstocks the display, moves it to another location and then places the stock back onto the display. This lack of flexibility detracts from the usefulness and effectiveness of many display stands in selling the most product possible. Examples of display stands which are not mobile are found, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. RE. 32,668; 4,949,851; 4,801,024; 4,760,928; 4,726,476; 4,723,664; 4,646,922; 4,493,424; 4,311,100; 4,151,803; and 2,797,815.
This problem of lack of mobility has been addressed in the past, but many display stands designed for portability present other problems which detract from their usefulness. For example, many display stands having wheels, casters or the like to permit movement thereof suffer from a lack of aesthetic appeal, i.e. the wheel assemblies are clearly visible which detracts from their appearance and/or interferes with the articles of merchandise on display. See for example U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,744,474; 4,740,010; 4,441,734; 3,087,740; 2,990,764; 2,868,557; and 2,842,373.